Vicki Wilson planted a spiral of hens and chicks, a succulent plant, in her front yard.Melissa Binder/The Oregonian

Vicki Wilson is a lot like hens and chicks.

Not the clucking birds. The succulent plants.

The hardy rosettes spread their beauty with little encouragement and thrive in inhospitable climates. They can take care of themselves. The succulents were among the first plants she put in the dirt at the Foster-Powell Community Garden.

It's a site she dearly hopes to see flourish.

"They're a symbol to me of giving, of carrying on," Wilson said.

In recent years Wilson has done quite a bit of giving and, despite the challenges of creating a community garden on site where digging isn't allowed, she's carried on. The 39-year-old sculpture artist and the garden she's working so hard to build are proof it only takes one person to start a project -- and one project to spark change.

An idea takes root

Wilson and her husband, John Larson, bought their first home in Foster-Powell in 2009. The area, formerly known as "Felony Flats," has taken off since the end of the recession, but still faces the highest violent crime rates among all the neighborhoods of Southeast Portland west of Southeast 82nd Avenue.

The pair met working for Michael Curry Design, where for 11 years Larson headed design projects for Disneyland in Hong Kong, Michael Jackson's "This Is It" tour and more. Wilson was a craftsperson on and off during that time.

The couple joined the neighborhood's garden tour two years after arriving, and after Wilson planted a spiral of her own hens and chicks in their front yard. She attended a neighborhood association meeting because she thought she had to as a tour participant.

One meeting was all it took. The artist was inspired by the association's efforts to better the up-and-coming neighborhood and sought to help. She identified an empty, paved and trash-ridden lot at the corner of Southeast 62nd Avenue and Powell Boulevard as one of the area's worst eyesores.

Artists work to develop Foster-Powell Community GardenArtists Vicki Wilson and John Larson (they're married) moved into a house on the block a few years ago. In 2011 Vicki set her mind to turning an eye sore lot at 62nd Ave, and Powell Blvd., that was formerly a gas station into a community garden. It took two years of paperwork and waiting to even get access to the site. For a year now they have been working to create a garden. Volunteers have helped but they've done the bulk of the work themselves.

She hatched a plan to establish a community garden, a shared space for neighbors to rent plots for produce, and went back to the neighborhood association to ask for support.

"They were like, 'What? Who are you? And OK,'" Wilson said, laughing.

The 5,662-square-foot property belongs to the Oregon Department of Transportation, and has been vacant for decades. At the time Wilson discovered it, the land was overgrown with blackberries and home to unwanted junk people tossed over the surrounding fence.

Wilson, whose dark pixie-cut hair is graying around her temples, spent two years intermittently filling out paperwork and corresponding via email with ODOT officials. Her copies are packed into two 2-inch binders.

Wilson said she had to adjust her proposal several times because the site, a former gas station, is tricky. The soil is minutely contaminated. Though it's safe to grow food in planters, ODOT won't allow any de-paving or digging, and water must be kept in a container.

At the end of March 2013, Kermit Meling, an ODOT permit specialist, unlocked the property and gave Wilson the key.

"I thought, 'Wow, they're actually letting us do this,'' Larson said. "I just figured it was never going to happen."

The property is a challenging spot, said Meling. "But they've jumped through every hoop."

Neighborhood in bloom

In a city where most established neighborhoods are fighting to stop change, Foster-Powell says "yes." It's a neighborhood where young couples are converting dilapidated houses into family homes, a neighborhood that applauds when a developer proposes a row of skinny houses.

The neighborhood's crime rate, though higher than other Southeast neighborhoods west of 82nd Avenue, isn't far ahead of established Hosford Abernethy, Richmond or Sellwood-Moreland.

"We're really focused on preventing the fear of crime a lot of the time," said Brad Taylor, the city's crime prevention coordinator in Foster-Powell. "If you see your neighbors out walking about and talking to one another, you're going to be less fearful."

The garden could play a major role in curbing both real and perceived crime, Taylor said. A clean, landscaped corner will tell would-be criminals the street isn't ideal for illegal activity.

"The wonky term for it is 'territoriality,'" he said. "It's a visual cue that you're entering an area that people care about."

Though the corner is far from looking or functioning like a finished garden, the project has already helped neighbors get to know one another and given them something to protect – key aspects of Taylor's vision for crime prevention.

Wilson held a plant exchange on the lot soon after gaining access in 2013. Only a handful of neighbors showed up. One of them was Cecilia Haas, who moved to the neighborhood begrudgingly in 2008.

Foster-Powell was farther out and rougher looking than she would have liked, she said. She quickly changed her mind when she saw how much her neighbors cared about improving the area – and how quickly the neighborhood was changing for the better.

"Vicki is amazing," Haas said. "You can't help but admire her. She had a vision and she ran with it. Not a lot of people would spend years of their lives doing that."

Haas was inspired by Wilson's drive, and she wanted in on the project badly enough to spend every weekend that summer moving dirt. Haas and a group of neighbors formed a committee to support the project.

"My hope is that it will become a grounding spot for the neighborhood," Haas said. "That's an important thing to have in a neighborhood with so much turnover."

Andy and Allyson Greazel are one of many young couples new to the neighborhood. The newlywed pair moved from San Diego and purchased the house adjacent to the community garden last July.

The house had been a rental prior to their arrival, Wilson said, and the landlord had struggled to sell a house that sat next to a vacant, blackberry-infested lot.

The Greazels bought the house on faith, they said: Faith in Wilson.

"Once I met her I realized this was her passion," Allyson Greazel said. "She was going to get this done."

The couple supports Wilson's garden efforts by keeping "a watchful eye" on the property, Greazel said, while they work on updates to their own house. They've agreed to let Wilson use their outdoor water spigot, and Frank, the couple's 20-pound grey cat, has become known to volunteers as garden's mascot.

"It's been cool to go through our life transformation while watching the garden go through transformation," Greazel said.

Because they can

The lot now has flowers outside the gate. A giant planter is home to a clay angel and an apple tree, and concrete blocks hold dirt and young plants in place along the north wall. The gate is decorated with an oval wooden sign: "Foster Powell Community Garden Established 2013."

Children and adults painted wooden flowers at the April plant sale and raffle. Vicki Wilson plans to hang the flowers on the fence to discourage people from climbing into the lot.Melissa Binder/The Oregonian

Wilson tried again this year to hold an event that would raise awareness and cash, this time with a committee of helpers. Neighbors and their children streamed in and out of the garden for hours, many of them taking time to paint a wooden flower to hang on the fence.

"Everybody on this block is emotionally invested," Wilson said. "Everybody is rooting for it."

Getting the neighborhood on board hasn't necessarily made the project easier. Lots of families care about the garden, Wilson said, but few have the time or money to help it move forward.

"It's like a stab when people say it doesn't look like anything is happening," Wilson said.

She and Larson have spent more than half of their 2013 and 2014 weekends shoveling dirt, writing grant proposals and looking for creative ways to keep costs down. The couple got dirt, concrete and other supplies for free on Craigslist last year, but the next steps will be costly. The garden needs cisterns to hold water and quality wood for more than 20 planters.

The couple was recently denied three grants they'd hoped would fund the remaining major steps.

"When we could do it all for free it felt very attainable," Larson said. "Now that we need money it feels like more of a burden."

But the artists are used to big projects, and approaching problems creatively comes naturally. Given the huge design productions the couple has tackled in their careers, Larson said the garden is actually one of the easiest projects they've done together.

"We know how to do this kind of thing," Wilson said. "If anybody was going to do it, we should because we can."

Wilson dug up half the hens and chicks from her front yard this spring to sell at a fundraiser for the garden. The removals left her own yard looking a little raggedy.

It should come as no surprise. Wilson has spent three years giving time and effort to a project that isn't guaranteed to succeed. "That's the nature of artists," Wilson said.

Don't worry about the yard, she said. The spiral will grow back in no time. Hens and chicks give freely, and they always carry on.